THE FORERUNNER OF THE SERVANT
Mark 1:1-8
“1 ¶ The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. 2 As it is written in Isaiah the prophet: "BEHOLD, I SEND MY MESSENGER AHEAD OF YOU, WHO WILL PREPARE YOUR WAY; 3 THE VOICE OF ONE CRYING IN THE WILDERNESS, ’MAKE READY THE WAY OF THE LORD, MAKE HIS PATHS STRAIGHT.’" 4 John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5 And all the country of Judea was going out to him, and all the people of Jerusalem; and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins. 6 John was clothed with camel’s hair and wore a leather belt around his waist, and his diet was locusts and wild honey. 7 And he was preaching, and saying, "After me One is coming who is mightier than I, and I am not fit to stoop down and untie the thong of His sandals. 8 "I baptized you with water; but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.’”
We begin our study of Mark with verse one and verse one tells us the name of this book, or at least what Mark wants to accomplish from writing this book. “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God,” and this is only the beginning of the story for it still goes on today and will continue to go on until all of those who have accepted this Gospel are safely in heaven spending eternity with our Lord.
Dr. Paul S. Rees says this about the gospel of Mark: “The Gospel is neither a discussion nor a debate, it is an announcement.” We can see the announcement in the very first verse of Marks Gospel.
Mark begins this fast paced story of the Lord Jesus Christ by saying that we must understand about the gospel of Jesus Christ, who by the way is the very Son of God, saying that Jesus Christ is the second person of the godhead, the One who put on humanity in order to fulfill what God first spoke of way back in Genesis 3:15, “And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.’” In John MacArthur’s Study Bible we see this note from Genesis 3:15, “bruise you on the head…bruise him on the heel. This ‘first gospel’ is prophetic of the struggle and its outcome between ‘your seed’ (Satan and unbelievers, who are called the Devil’s children in Jn. 8:44) and her seed (Christ, a descendant of Eve, and those in Him), which began in the garden. In the midst of the curse passage, a message of hope shone forth—the woman’s offspring called ‘He” is Christ, who will one day defeat the Serpent. Satan could only ‘bruise’ Christ’s heel (cause Him to suffer), while Christ will bruise Satan’s head (destroy him with a fatal blow). Paul, in a passage strongly reminiscent of Genesis 3, encouraged the believers in Rome, ‘And the God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet’ (Ro. 16:20). Believers should recognize that they participate in the crushing of Satan because, along with their Savior and because of His finished work on the cross, they also are the woman’s seed. For more on the destruction of Satan, see Heb. 2:14, 15; Rev. 20:10.”
We see in that first verse the word “gospel” and in this case it is the gospel of Jesus Christ, and we see in other places in the Bible that it is the gospel of God, or the gospel of grace. All of these are the same, for there is only one true Gospel even in times past the word was used in Roman times to announce their king. Euaggelion is the Greek word translated gospel and it means “good news.” We find this word in the Greek translation of the OT, the Septuagint as it is called, for the OT was actually written mostly in Hebrew with a few passages in Aramaic that can be found in Daniel and Nehemiah, but the rest is in Hebrew. Before the times of the NT the OT was translated into Greek and we find the word “Euaggelion” in that translation. Isaiah 40 it can be found along with Isaiah 52.
We know that Mark audience was mostly Roman and their also Jews living there too so this word would be very familiar to them, but now let’s go back to Isaiah forty to see where this word is used there. “1 ¶ "Comfort, O comfort My people," says your God. 2 "Speak kindly to Jerusalem; And call out to her, that her warfare has ended, That her iniquity has been removed, That she has received of the LORD’S hand Double for all her sins.’” (Isa. 40:1-2) Isaiah is writing about the people who would be exiled in Babylon would be coming back to Jerusalem. This is also looking far into the future when Israel would again return to Jerusalem after being gone for many years. Both occasions for leaving were because of sin, but now they are to be comforted.
9 ¶ Get yourself up on a high mountain, O Zion, bearer of good news, Lift up your voice mightily, O Jerusalem, bearer of good news; Lift it up, do not fear. Say to the cities of Judah, "Here is your God!’” (Isaiah 40:9) The word translated “good news” is our word “Euaggelion.”
We see these words “good news” again in this verse of Isaiah, and this time Isaiah is announcing the arrival of God “Here is your God.” Isaiah is announcing the very best news possible, there can be not greater good news that the arrival of God to the earth. The word is again used in Isaiah 52: 7 “ How lovely on the mountains Are the feet of him who brings good news, Who announces peace And brings good news of happiness, Who announces salvation, And says to Zion, "Your God reigns!’” Paul quotes this verse to the Romans in Romans 10:15 to tell how this good news will be heard. “How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, "HOW BEAUTIFUL ARE THE FEET OF THOSE WHO BRING GOOD NEWS OF GOOD THINGS!’”
We see also in verse one that Mark is the one who states that this is the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ and we have to believe that Mary has seen some of the things that he is going to write about even though we must assume that he does get a lot of his information from Peter. Mark is the first witness among others that he will use to show that Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah, and the chosen One of God. The second wittiness will be that of the prophets and this can be seen in verses 2-3: “. 2 As it is written in Isaiah the prophet: "BEHOLD, I SEND MY MESSENGER AHEAD OF YOU, WHO WILL PREPARE YOUR WAY; 3 THE VOICE OF ONE CRYING IN THE WILDERNESS, ’MAKE READY THE WAY OF THE LORD, MAKE HIS PATHS STRAIGHT.’"
We see in the quotation from the OT that the prophets are speaking of one who will come to announce the arrival of the King, and this section is actually from two prophets, Isaiah and Malachi. Malachi 3:1 is the first quotation and Isaiah 40:3 is the second quotation. Isaiah is the more prominent prophet so Mark only uses his name when he gives this quote. I want to take a moment and quote Malachi 3:1 to show that there is a little difference in what it says and the way that Mark writes it here: “"Behold, I am going to send My messenger, and he will clear the way before Me. And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant, in whom you delight, behold, He is coming," says the LORD of hosts.” As I wrote before it is the Holy Spirit who was the One who gave the Words of the Bible to the human authors and so sometimes when we see a quote from the OT it is exactly the same, and other times it is a bit different as in this case, and other times it is an interpretation of what the OT prophet wrote. We can see the highlighted phrases here showing that it is actually the Lord who is coming and His messenger will be the one who will clear the way for him. This was something that happened many times during this time period, for a king would send a person before him to make the way clear for him to arrive at a place, and this is what happens here. The prophecy is speaking of John the Baptist or better yet John the Baptizer.
There are a lot of things written about John the Baptist in the NT, but Mark keeps his comments brief when talking about him here. He will latter talk about him some more, but here he wants to show that John will be the one who will prepare the way for the Lord, and then in the next verses Mark will show what he does to prepare the way for the Lord.
This prophecy shows that there will be a forerunner to come before the Lord and later on the disciples of Jesus ask Him about Elijah, for it is written that Elijah will come before the Lord, and Jesus tells them that if He would have been accepted by Israel then John the Baptist would have filled that role, but as it turns out both John the Baptist and Jesus were killed. This brings up a point that is interesting to write about and that is that when Jesus comes again will Elijah come before Him and many people who have studied the Bible say that one of the two wittiness that are found in Revelations 11:3 and following will be Elijah.
The next witness who will show the Jesus is who He claims to be is John the Baptist and we can see that in verses four through eight: “4 John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 5 And all the country of Judea was going out to him, and all the people of Jerusalem; and they were being baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins. 6 John was clothed with camel’s hair and wore a leather belt around his waist, and his diet was locusts and wild honey. 7 And he was preaching, and saying, "After me One is coming who is mightier than I, and I am not fit to stoop down and untie the thong of His sandals. 8 "I baptized you with water; but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.’”
Verse four states the John was preaching a baptism of repentance for forgiveness of sins. This is highly unusual in Judaism, for there is no baptism in Judaism with the exception of a proselyte, a Gentile, who wants to come into the faith of Judaism, and then he or she has to be baptized. Now here is where it gets interesting. Jewish people know that only Gentiles got baptized when joining the Jewish faith, and the Jews disliked the Gentiles so now those who had come to be baptized by John were actually putting themselves in the place of these Gentiles who needed cleansing from their sins. Verse five talks about the great amount of people that came to John to be baptized.
We see in verse six the kind of clothes that John wore and also where he was doing the baptisms. John was clothed like Elijah and ministered near the place where Elijah ministered. I suppose that you can say that John’s messages were as fearless as Elijah’s were. John knew what he was called to do for his parents got that message from the angel and so he lived all of his life out in the wilderness doing what the Lord had called him to do.
Before I write more about the wilderness I want to write about verses seven and eight where John speaks about Jesus. Verse seven speaks of the humbleness of John in that as it is put in John’s Gospel that he must decrease, and Jesus must increase, and he was not even fit to untie the thong of His sandals. Taking of the sandals of someone was the lowest of the lowest when it came to servants and John says that he was lower than that, for he was not worth of untying the sandals of Jesus. Then he says that he only baptizes with water, but Jesus will baptize with the Holy Spirit and in the other Gospels he adds fire. What does this mean? Well when Jesus baptizes His followers with the Holy Spirit that is showing that He is their Savior for all true believers of Jesus are baptized with the Holy Spirit at the moment of their belief in Him. As far as baptizing with fire that shows the baptism of judgment to those who reject His offer of salvation.
Now I want to quote from John MacArthur’s sermon on this section of Scripture. He is here talking about those who came out to the wilderness to be baptized by John: Well everybody practically wanted to be a part of the Messiah’s Kingdom. They didn’t want to be left out. They knew their own heart’s sinfulness. So, according to verse five, all the country of Judea was going out to him, all the people of Jerusalem were being baptized by him in the Jordan river, confessing their sins. This looks like a national revival.
“By making this pilgrimage, Mark Hore(?) writes to the Jordan, ‘Those who believed John’s message showed that they wanted to visibly separated from those under judgment when the Lord comes. They wanted to be members of the future unified Israel, undergoing John’s baptism helping them anticipate that they were not only God’s covenant people, but that they would remain in that covenant after God cast others out. In order to be assured that they would be included in the future forgiven Israel whose iniquity would be removed, they needed to repent and ask for personal forgiveness not.”
“Why the wilderness? William Lane writes, and I think it’s well stated, ‘The summons to be baptized in the Jordan means that Israel must once more come to the wilderness. As Israel long ago hand been separated from Egypt by a pilgrimage through the waters of the Red Sea, the nation exhorted again to exercise separation. The people are called to a second exodus in preparation for a new covenant with God. As the people heed John’s call to a second exodus in preparation for a new covenant with God. As the people heed John’s call to and go out to him in the desert, far more is involved than contrition and confession. They return to a place of judgment, the wilderness, where the status of Israel as God’s beloved must be reestablished in the exchange of pride for humility. The willingness to return to the wilderness signifies the acknowledgment of Israel’s history as one of disobedience and rebellion, and a desire to begin once more.’ Let’s go back to the wilderness before we ever came into the land and start all over again.”
We will look at the baptism of Jesus the next time (Lord willing).
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